Daughter of Hyrule: Dances Through Shadow
by Miss Leanne
Summary: Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Tells of the life-story and quests of Impa and how she guided and influenced Link, the Hero of Time, in his quest. Rated T for violence and gore in later chapters, told in first-person POV.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I feel bad that I've not added anything to my "Daughters of Hyrule" series in almost a year and half. With that being said, I hope that you'll enjoy Impa's story.**

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**Daughter of Hyrule: Dances Through Shadow**

**By**

"**Miss Leanne"**

**Edited by**

"**Miss Takin"**

_I make no pretense to be anyone other than who I am. I am no queen, though I was the only woman in someone's life. I am no mother figure, though I was a mother once. I am neither patron saint nor guardian angel, though I have been a fighter guardian to one—that is all that I need._

_The stories that I can tell…I hold more in my vast galaxy of memories than many other people have. _

_Wars, battles, deaths, births, love, new life. _

_I have seen wars, rumors of wars, and every manner of battle and combat. Indeed, I am called 'Fighting Mother' by the remnant race that is my people. _

_When I look back at my life, I am reminded that we are just part of a great cycle that began before we were born and will continue to spin long after we're gone. _

_My part of the cycle is that I played a part in the Hero of Time's tale. A small part, to be sure, but it was vital. _

_Perhaps one day, this world will not struggle like the world I have seen. Maybe, there will be a time of peace. _

_But, Goddesses be thanked, I have had the privilege and the joy of seeing more than simple bloodshed._

_My dances through the shadows start in the town I was raised, Kakariko, just east of the Great Castle Town of Hyrule. It was the year before my coming of age rite, and my whole town was about to witness the beginning of the rite for a group of girls, soon to be made women._

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That heady scent of Gerudo cinnamon and spice hung heavy on the air. The sun was setting, twilight's last fingers scraping across the sky in a final effort to hold the day to itself. The heat of the torches intensified the smell somehow, and the wind softly carried scents to my nostrils.

The holy Tent of Rites had already been erected. The cloth that draped over the elegant fairy-wood was centuries old, golden orange veins crawled across an almost violently purple ocean. Tassels woven of silver from the Goron City lined the entire piece of cloth. It was just a cloth, but it had more history behind it than nearly anything the Sheikah tribe owned as a community.

Just one-hundred and nine years after the Goddesses whirled into being the realm that is Hyrule, our first Mother Protector, the one we sing of at holy times such as these, brought this cloth back to her family. She had gone to war with the King of Hyrule at the time, and after five years, her family assumed she was dead.

She was, in fact, very much alive. Her family greeted her with wild joy, delighted that their eldest daughter was not only safe but carried many treasures from far-off lands they had never heard of into their home. One of the treasures she carried was that of the purple and orange cloth. At the time, there were none of the Goron silver tassels upon it, but it must have still been a sight to see.

Her family asked from which country this beauty came from, and her answer was not what they were expecting. Our community sings in the ballad that her eyes sparkled when she began to talk. Our first Mother Protector said that the noble cloth had come from the King of Hyrule himself. In fact, it was Hylian-spun, and was woven of the finest silken threads, and seemed to have a heavy glow of its own.

Her family asked why the King would give her such a gift of great worth, and she answered that the King had fallen in love with her as they had campaigned across foreign lands. The King's grandfather had had the length woven to celebrate the life of his first child, a tiny boy. Because he had been born far too early, the baby had been sickly in the first months of its life, but miraculously grew stronger and lived to see his first birthday.

Goddesses be praised, the boy continued to live and soon became the King to succeed his father. He also sired the son that our first Mother Protector fell passionately in love with.

During those days, the Sheikah tribe was not a secret. They had no stealth to accompany their style of fighting like our warriors have nearly millennia later. They held open arms to all visitors and fed them as though they were family. Everyone knew where to find our Sheikah town in cases of need for sanctuary.

But now, another link was to be established between the House of the Sheikah and the House of the Royals of Hyrule. Our Mother Protector begged her father to bless her marriage to the King. She said that she wanted to have the wedding ceremony under the very length of cloth that the King had given to her. Her father gave her blessing, and she began preparations for her wedding day.

But our Mother Protector's heart was broken too soon. Both she and the King were quite young, even after their five-year long journey. Their wisdom had not yet grown to maturity, so she and the King had trekked across many countries for years, standing on the offensive and inciting war wherever they had gone, making unwise decisions much of the time. Their campaign was more offensive than an older King would have advised, and thus made many countries angry. Just before her wedding day, the castle of Hyrule was attacked by the armies of the rulers who wanted revenge.

Our ballad tells that she tirelessly ran across plains, through forests, and swam across rivers when she had heard the news. When she got there, she saw that she was too late. Hyrule Castle had been completely ransacked and burned to the ground. It would take years to rebuild what had been so maliciously undone, but her mind was already searching and calling for the King that she had grown to love.

She found him with a broken sword in his hand, and more arrows than she could count through his heart, stomach, and arms.

A millennia later, our song echoed her mourning cries. Our Mother Protector held her dead lover for hours and could not move from the place. Hyrule's attackers were still on the rampage though, and she swore that she would fill the King's place in combat.

We sing that she slayed thousands single-handedly, whether by her own power or by the Goddesses', but every woman knows that the power of the heart overcomes and inspires every physical power. Our Mother Protector's family and entire community had heard and answered her calls to battle, and one day they came together as one to help her fight the armies that had attacked the City of Hyrule.

She and our race had victory that day, but her infinite pain caused her to withdraw from all but her own world. She could fight anywhere with any weapon, she could travel across terrains without rest or sleep, and she loved greater than anyone else, but her love lay dead, and his death dealt an cut into her heart that never healed.

In response to her withdrawal, her entire community followed suit. Travelers were not allowed through the village and were forced to find another path if they desired to pray at the temple upon Death Mountain. No longer did trade occur between the Sheikah town and others, and Sheikah and outsider communication came to a standstill. It was as if they had crawled deep under a giant boulder and had decided to never come out.

Our first Mother Protector took the cloth that already symbolized much to her, and hung it at every wedding that took place in her community. She hung it at rites of passage for males and females alike. But she never raised it for her own wedding or for her own children's rite of passage, for she had neither. She remained devoted to her people and simply watched their joy, but had no real joy of her own in her heart. We sing that her heart died with the King of Hyrule.

Even though another King was raised up to take the place of the former and Hyrule City was slowly rebuilt, communications never occurred as they had before.

So the great cloth that hung where the rite of passage would soon take place carries joy and tears in its weaving. A thousand years later, on that night, our community would usher in a new group of girls who would become adults. They would complete the ritual that has been performed since the first Mother Protector made it tradition.

I sat in the area designated for the Mother Protector under the great cloth. I was the daughter of the Mother Protector who led at the time. The sight of the girls dressed in light armor with their weapons on their back thrilled me, but I was just seven that day, and my rites were far off.

The girls who were to be made women that night lined the platform in front of my _mamelah_, awaiting her blessing and the signal to begin. They knew exactly what would happen as the ritual begins to start its course: they would run along the same paths that our tribe believes the first Mother Protector ran across to reach her lover King.

It sounds simple, but it is not. Even at a run from start to finish, the journey is difficult and takes a full night to complete. This is no competition between the girls, but they must all complete it within the given time. Twelve hours is all they have. Their time begins when the sun completely sets.

The girls would be completely initiated the night after they ran the course, but they trained for years in preparation for that day. They all looked so fleet-footed, and they swing their arms excitedly and jump in place in front of my _mamelah_'s platform. Some look as though the fairies that are in their stomach will come out of their throat.

The sun is just a hairline from setting, and an old tradition is about to begin anew.

We sing to encourage the girls:

_Run, run, run across fen and fern_

_Dash lightly over sands and winds_

_Part the waters you swim through_

_Hold the heart of a King with just a glance_

_Bring back treasures from your own heart_

_And become the blessed woman you were born to be_

The sun set during our song, and the girls turned towards the farthest horizon and got ready to run as fast as they could.

My mother stood and lifted her arm kerchief, and held it in the air for a moment. Then she dropped her arm suddenly, and the girls dug the toes of their boots into the dirt and dash off towards the destination they will reach in the morning.

They would run all night to the sacred place on the other side of Hyrule, and then they would be considered women—eligible for marriage and handed the responsibility of keeping our tribe strong with children of their own.

We shouted our usual cheer for girls coming of age as they ran past us into the great Hyrule plains. Our cries are particularly distinctive, with the tongue batting from the roof of the mouth to the floor while giving our throats full throttle. It's a sound that isn't easily imitated, which is why ours is set apart so well.

As the girls left the village, the excitement died down. The mothers and fathers of the girls climbed into their horse-drawn carts to go to the altar where the girls' rite would be completed. The parents would sleep there at the temple until the girls started arriving.

My _mamelah_ took my hand and we walked back into our house, the one that overlooks the entrance to Kakariko. We were silent on the walk back, but it was not a painful or unhappy silence. It was a silence that was full of the joy of our Mother Protector, who knew that her daughter would one day be among those blessed girls. It was a silence that carried the desire of the daughter to race the sacred race.

Once we were in our house, my mother spoke to me.

"The day you will run the Path is coming soon, little one." That was all she said, but her face was radiant.

I looked up at her and smiled.

"You'll be there to see me at the altar," I answered.

She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, filling her nostrils with the scent of our new wooden floor. I knew, because she remarked on its scent quite often.

"I will see you at the altar, to be sure. And your father will see you there, even though he is not with us," she said.

My smile faltered a little, and I hung my head. _Mamelah_ saw my action and picked me up and held me close to her neck while she carried me to the fire. Our "fire time" was our hour to relax and talk over the days' events. That night, the excitement had worn me down, and I was nodding in my chair before I had been seated for half a moment.

I finally closed my eyes and allowed sleep to take me over. My dreams were filled with running legs, pounding on the ground. Only the legs were all mine, somehow attached to my small body. Chants filled my head, and the dream slipped away.

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	2. Chapter 2

So many times when I was young, I would ask my mother for the story of my birth. The story always held great fascination for me, but it was a tale of great pain for her.

She would begin: "You were born far too early. The stars by which your birth had been calculated had not turned into their courses yet, but my body began pushing you and your brother out just the same."

My mother told me of the older brother I had never met, that had never lived. "The midwife came and soon she asked me to start pushing. At the time, I did not know that I was carrying twins. I knew that I was bigger than other women in the village who were set to deliver their babies at the time I was, but the thought didn't occur to me."

"When your brother came out, I saw immediately that he would never take his first breath. He had already left for the Immortals' Plane." As a Sheikah tribe, we believe that when a person dies, they go to another plane above the earth. There is the lower plane, where most mortals dwell and live out their lives, and then there is the higher plane where the Immortals reign and mortal souls go after death.

My mother continued, "His face was a pearly blue, and his fingernails were tiny and purple. He had dark, thin hair and his mouth was so beautiful. It looked almost as if he were ready to suddenly turn pink and begin crying, but such a thing couldn't happen. He was perfect in every way except for being alive."

"I held your brother and cried over him, stroking his smooth forehead, but no sooner had the midwife handed him to me than she cried out, 'There is another infant!' Instinctively, I began pushing. My heart clenched, fearing that this other baby would be stillborn like the first. Instead, I was blessed with the sound of a healthy, squalling baby. I looked over to see you, and hope came into my heart again.

"'She's a girl!' the midwife exclaimed, and I laid my dead baby beside me to cradle you. I wrapped you in your first blanket and laid the most loving and joyful kiss on your forehead. Even though you were nearly inconsolable while the midwife and I gave you your first bath, you settled down soon enough when I gave you suckle, Impa." I smiled with pride.

"You were every bit as beautiful as your brother. Instead of dark hair, you had a light lavender-gray shade of hair. Every Sheikah mother dreams of having a baby with hair such as yours, but few are ever blessed with one. Your eyes were blue just like a Sheikah baby's should be."

This was the first time that I had heard I had been born with blue eyes. I hadn't any idea that a Sheikah baby was supposed to have them in the first place.

"Mother, my eyes are red now. Did they appear to be blue when I was born?" I asked.

"No, dear heart, rare is the Sheikah baby that is born with red eyes, as yours are now. Most babies in our tribe are born with blue or brown eyes, and gradually over a few years, they turn into the correct shade of red."

All I could say was, "Oh." I was more stunned than anything else. I had never seen a baby to begin with, so there was no reason to doubt my mother's ability to distinguish between colors. My mother saw the surprise in my face, smiled at me, and pulled me close to her to begin her story again.

"I watched your every little movement. You wrinkled your brow whenever a strange sound occurred, and wrinkled your nose when you smelled something you didn't like. You waved your arm and squirmed when you were ready to be changed. Even though I knew you couldn't smile or return my affection yet, I saw in your eyes that you had become attached to me. So many nights I would cry

'I love you!', but I could tell you were quite unimpressed, as you only yawned." She grinned as she related this last part to me.

"We buried your older brother the same day that you and he were born. In Sheikah custom, it is bad practice to name a stillborn infant, as their spirit is said to return to haunt you. I named him anyway, because a visit from my first baby, even if he was in spirit, would be most welcome to me.

"Since I would never see what your brother might have been like, I simply named him Sheik. It's a strong name that denotes leadership in our community. The word 'Sheikah' means 'race of leaders' in our language. Perhaps he is a leader among the Immortals on the higher plane." My mother's gaze went far away. She looked at my face, which I'm sure appeared to be quite curious, and continued her story.

"As I fulfilled my role as Mother Protector of the Sheikah tribe, I took you everywhere I went. The midwife made a thick sling to go over my shoulder so that I could carry you with ease. I helped my friends deliver their babies with you on my chest, I led tribal meetings while I held you on my neck, and I oversaw the martial training of the Sheikah children with you secured onto my back. I never laid you down in your cradle, I always brought you to sleep in the crook of my arm at night."

"Your birth was such a comfort to me after the death of my husband and your father. He died in combat, when the Sheikah and Gerudo of the West clashed on the edge of the Great Forest. He was the bravest Sheikah warrior I knew, and even before you were born, he whispered over my growing belly how much he already loved you. I can't imagine what he would have thought when he discovered your brother never took his first breath. I was blessed with such an idyllic existence; I suppose the Goddesses saw it fit to bring tears into my life. I am not bitter." I craned my neck from my vantage point to see my mother's eyes in a far, far away place, in a land full of memories. She stroked my arm and turned to look at me.

"How could I be bitter when They gave me you?"

She held me very close then. While she loved me dearer than her own breath, I know now that she deeply missed my father and my brother.

The years passed and I grew from a skinny six-year old into a strong child of ten. My martial training formally began at seven, and gradually I mastered the arts of hand-to-hand combat, long and short sword training, and series of kicks and punches meant to bring an enemy down in half a heartbeat. My _mamelah_'s wishes were that I would be able to defend my little town and a family of my own if the need ever arose. The martial training was enjoyable for me, but at ten I was much more of a home-body than a connoisseur of combat. Still, I obeyed my mother's wishes and learned the tactics I might need one day.

When I was not completing my martial lessons, I was usually at work doing menial chores around my house, such as carrying water, stoking the fire, making sure our dinner didn't burn, keeping the neighbor's chickens out of our vegetable garden, and the like. I always thought our house was the best out of the entire Sheikah village. It overlooked the main entrance to our village from the Hyrule Plains so that my mother and I could watch for any intruders (or so I imagined). The only other entrance to the village was the passage from Death Mountain, where a race of creatures with rocks for bodies lived. We never received visitors to our village from those creatures, but _mamelah_ said that before I was born, they sometimes passed through our village to pay tribute to the Hylian king.

My life wasn't all peace, quiet and martial training. Despite the fact that I tended towards being a home person, I was definitely among the more rowdy female children. I competed in rock-throwing contests with boys and girls alike, held my breath the longest underwater, and could run the fastest in our races.

There was one timid boy in our group whose name was Tonto. His three brothers before him were positively fearless, but little Tonto was the exact opposite. Anything that was taller or a stranger made him tremble to the bottoms of his boots. He was nine to my ten years, and he had been going through the martial arts with his father and some of the other fathers of the village, but he never seemed to pick it up completely.

Of course, at my age, there is no compassion for children who are weak, male or female. While the other children tended to draw away or ignore him, I unfortunately took more than a little pleasure in tormenting him. Many times, I would challenge him to a hand-to-hand fight—I knew this was the place where he would be weakest. I would get into the classic starting position for hand combat: arms up, fists curled with thumbs out, and feet spread in a firm stance on the ground. Oh…and a vicious face to complete the picture.

Tonto would whimper but would take up my challenge. I would squint my eyes just before I made the first strike, and inevitably, within three punches to the chest, he would be on his hind end on the ground and sobbing loudly, face raised to the heavens as if the Goddesses themselves would rescue a silly coward-child.

"_Ach_, go home, you stupid wimp!" I would shout in his face, folding my arms to my chest and looking away in disgust. Tonto would roll onto his stomach, crawl to his feet, and then run to his house crying as he went.

Later, when my girlfriends and I were starting to walk back to our homes, my best friend, Etheria piped up, "You need to be nicer to Tonto. He could end up your husband one day."

I threw my head back and laughed dramatically. Tonto a husband? A supporter, provider and defender of a family? Ridiculous, at least to my childish mind.

"You never know," Etheria continued, "Your mother and the village counselors will be making matches between the girls and the boys very soon….in just six months time."

It was Sheikah custom to create "matches" between young children so that they had time to get to know each other's character and behavior before they were married many years later. The breaking of a "match" is very nearly unheard of. The two that were "matched" cannot break it unless there is something severely wrong with one or the other's basic moral character. And even then, the "match" is not lightly broken and could sometimes takes half a decade to officially break. In other words, a match is taken seriously.

The Sheikah counsel would gather together and discuss an individual child's character and general demeanor. They would be carefully matched up to a member of the opposite gender who would compliment the other. Usually, since the Sheikah tribe was a matriarchal one, the girls would be talked over first, and a boy would be matched to her. The process was long and drawn out, and the discussions could take close to a year.

As I walked with my girl friends to our homes, I thought about Tonto's older brothers. They were the picture of the perfect match, the perfect future husband—physically strong and able to fight any enemy to the death. But they were also kind-hearted and able to take care of newborn infants just as easily as a woman. The oldest of Tonto's brothers had just received his ear piercings, an honor given only to young Sheikah warriors recognized for the strength of their character and of their hand.

"Tonto could never merit the ear piercings, could he?" I asked aloud of my girlfriends.

Ephemera, the pessimistic one among my two friends spoke up, "Probably not. He can't even hold a short sword the right way, let alone use it. But how can he not? He's been receiving training from his father for eight seasons!"

Etheria said, "He needs time more than anything else. He—"

"—is as good as worth nothing," I broke in. "If he doesn't show bravery now, he won't show any later on." I tried to make my word final.

"I wouldn't give up on him," Ethery said. "Besides…he could become your future mate."

Etheria and Ephemera laughed out loud. "Imagine that," I growled, and marched for home. My two friends bid me good-night to my back, but I didn't return the salutation. I did not think it was funny that my friends thought that I could possibly be matched to that pale-hearted son of a chicken! He couldn't even stand up for himself when fighting with a girl. I dismissed him and my friends' laughter from my thoughts and began preparing for bed.

Many nights, as families were tucking their children in, and mothers feeding their newborn one last time before bed, I would climb onto the roof from the ladder in the attic of my house. I would lean my head back as far as it could go and I would watch the stars in their white pinpointed glory. The formations that my mother said oversaw my birth were three "tics" away, meaning my eleventh birthday would be in three months. I let my eyes wander over to other formations and I gazed at the giant fairy that seemed to dance, but was frozen for eternity with her arms raised high and her legs in a leap.

I wondered what it would be like to be a star formation.

I wondered what it would be like to be the moon and look down upon the mortals of the earth.

And for the briefest of moments, I wondered what it would be like to step out of my home, out of my village and be a great warrior in a terrible battle.

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**A/N: If you have a moment, I would love to hear your opinion on the story so far. Thanks so much!**


	3. Chapter 3

The years passed, my training continued, and I grew from a coltish child into a young teenager

The years passed, my training continued, and I grew from a coltish child into a young teenager. My rites of passage were approaching quickly, and I would get "the tickling fairies" in my stomach whenever I thought of the impending day. The year of female children born before I had had already run their race, fought their fight and celebrated their entrance into the adult world. The spring was coming soon, and so were the rites for the male children. Tonto's older brother, Lu-kas, would be completing the rite this time, and I will confide to the reader that I liked Lu-kas very much. My friends teased me about him endlessly, but I couldn't have cared less. What made the teasing so bearable is that I felt that Lu-kas knew I liked him, and I thought—and hoped—he liked me back.

When I first began acting less of a child and more of a woman, casting my eye on other males my age, my mother noticed almost immediately. She warned me over tending our vegetable garden one cool morning, "Males your age (and any age for that matter!) are oblivious to the attentions of a female. You have to knock them upside the head to make them realize that you have feelings for them."

So one day, I did exactly as Mother told me. I had just finished my days' martial training, and I was beginning the walk to draw water for dinner that night. I walked by Lu-kas' house, and there was Lu-kas, leaning against a fence, scratching his family's milk cow on her back with his fingers. The cow's eyes were drooping half-shut in lazy pleasure, but Lu-kas took my breath away. The sun was shining onto his golden-brown hair, and reflected minutely off his strong, ropey arms. His back was to me, and as I gazed upon him, I felt it was time to take my destiny into my hands.

I discovered a stick and then put it into my empty arrow quiver. I climbed the fence behind Lu-kas, watching his back was towards me and making certain my feet were as silent as the wind. I balanced perfectly on the top rail of the fence, and half a furlong behind Lu-kas, I carefully sat down. I do not know how Lu-kas did not become aware of me, but it was no matter.

I pulled out the stick from my quiver and aimed the side of it to the back of his neck. I paused and gathered my strength for a moment, and then struck—with only half my strength. I wanted to get his attention, but I did not want to leave a bruise where I wanted to leave a kiss.

I got his attention, sure enough. Lu-kas whirled around with his mouth agape, his eyes glowing shock. As soon as he looked at me and recognized that I was not a Western Gerudo come to slice his neck, the shock melted away and he smiled at me. He smiled, and I know my face turned the color of _mamelah's_ tomatoes.

Lu-kas stuttered, trying to keep the laughter back, "The daughter of our Mother Protector has come to see me?" He stated more than asked, and I nodded, continuing to hold my balance on the topmost rail. "I just wanted to see—how you were doing tonight," I said, searching for words.

Lu-kas never pulled his gentle gaze away from me. I could only glance briefly into his eyes, and then I was forced to look at the ground. Feelings I could not name rushed through my heart, and made my legs hot and shaky. The sensation was almost as if Mother had caught me doing something I shouldn't, but it was far more than that here.

Lu-kas was only a year older than I, but in the moments I dared to steal a glance at his beautiful face, his eyes said that he was much older than that. The golden hair looked as though it had been spun onto his head, and his pale skin was liberally dotted with playful-appearing freckles. His eyes were brown—plain to the casual observer; but to a young girl falling fast and hopelessly in love, they were orbs straight from the Goddesses themselves. Some might have called his chin overly pronounced, but I thought it fit his face well, and it seemed to match his medium-height cheekbones. His hands were strong, sure, and tender, and could wield a jit-su stick with a surety that few other children his age had.

He was, in short, flawless. Most especially to an adoring young girl's eyes.

Lu-kas opened his mouth to say something else, but just then Tonto came out of their house. He glanced furtively at Lu-kas and I, and then dropped his head nearly upon his chest.

"Mother told me to say that dinner is ready," he muttered under breath.

Lu-kas nodded and then turned to me. "Good night Impa. The Goddesses bless you with sweet dreams tonight."

"Thank you, and you as well," I answered. I wanted more of a conversation than we had actually had, but that was not to be the case. For now, I needed to be content with the fact that he had noticed and spoken to me—that was what I had been hoping for.

Lu-kas went towards his home, and I turned my head to watch and listen to their milk cow placidly chewing on her cud. I heard Lu-kas open the front door and go inside, and almost immediately became irritatingly aware of grass shifting and shuffling next to me, and I looked down from my perch to see Tonto with his fat lips in a moronic pout.

"What do you want, idiot?" I asked, injecting as much disdain as I could into my voice.

Actually, he wasn't much of an idiot anymore, but I would never admit that to anyone out loud. After nearly three years and six months, he had finally absorbed our tribe's martial arts and was becoming more successful at his parries, jabs and defensive maneuvers. Now, I could no longer beat him in a hand-to-hand match—instead of consistently beating him in matches, we had become equal in strength. The coward inside of him slowly chipped away bit by bit through the years.

But by no means did that mean that I had softened towards him. Quite the contrary—I was as hard towards him as I had ever been.

When Tonto didn't answer, I confronted him with my question again: "What do you want, idiot?"

Tonto still had that ugly pout on his face. "I want to know what you and my brother were talking about."

"None of your business," I said through clenched teeth, whirling my head back to observing the cow.

"It _is_ my business because he is my brother," he countered. I began angrily thinking that just a year ago he would have run back to his mother's skirts howling and crying to the Goddesses' to save him from the terrifying warrior-girl Impa (I admit to the reader that I had no shortage of conceited pride regarding myself).

But now…now he was starting to become an equal in words as well as strength. An uncomfortable thought began to form in my head: what if he surpassed me one day? The thought formed further: _He _would _surpass me one day—at physically-speaking. _He would give me all the trouble that I had given him over the years right back to me. One day—I was sure of it—he would send me home weeping to my mother's side after a brief battle.

I faced him, still angry at him and at the future. "I just wanted to see him," I said.

"Why did you want to see him?" Tonto asked.

It was then that I broke out of my selfish, teenaged train of thought and began detecting the first hint of jealousy. The exaggerated voice…the defensive body posture…the masked face…But why would he be jealous? And what of?

For the moment, I brushed the thoughts of jealousy aside and folded my arms across my chest. "I don't have to answer your question if I don't want to, Tonto."

Tonto heaved a sigh and stalked back into his house. In truth, I was relieved. He wouldn't have gotten an honest answer out of me anytime soon, but if he had pressed me any harder or longer, he would have.

As soon as Tonto's front door slammed shut, I jumped off the cow's fence and ran for home. I barged into my house to see my mother standing in the middle of the kitchen with her hands on her hips. The look on her face was quite unmistakable. I was in trouble.

"Where have you been?" she asked in a deadly tone of voice. My mother loved me, but she was a stickler for punctuality and being dependable. I had proved myself to be neither this evening.

I told the truth, "I was out talking to Lu-kas."

My mother's expression did not change, and she held the silence for what felt like at least an hour to me. She continued to hold my eyes and then said shortly, "Go and fetch the water."

I dashed out with the bucket, which had been sitting next to the door. At one moment, I felt stupid for not doing as I was told, but the next moment I was annoyed that she was telling me what to do in the first place. Did everything always have to be done on _her_ timetable? Was it such a big deal if it was not?

I ran to the villages' well, began threading the ropes through the well's bracer and carefully lowered the bucket into the dark, humid depths of the well. I gazed at the surface of the water and saw the sky in its twilight tones. The sun was setting behind me and I could feel its warmth on my back.

I received a sudden foreboding that soon everything would be changing drastically for me. I stiffened and considered what the sensation could mean. Well, I would be turning twelve springs soon, and my rite of passage would be coming in six tics of the stars. Those two events were certainly big events…but what else was coming?

As I quickly pulled the bucket up from the well, the realization hit me like a volley of speeding arrows.

I was to be matched to a male in my village soon after my rite of passage.

The thought hadn't occurred to me since that one night that I had beaten Tonto in the hand-to-hand fight. Fear suddenly attached itself to my spine, and the well-known movements that I normally used when bringing up water became sluggish and cold.

My thoughts ran wild and incomprehensible. I wasn't ready to be a wife! Imaginings of cooking for a husband and carrying his baby—a baby!—made my fingers treble.

I pulled the bucket out of the well and turned to go home. As I faced the setting sun, another feeling came to me just as fast as the first one had. Anticipation—just as quickly as I had become terrified of being a wife, I suddenly longed to be one. The sensations of my heart smashed into each other over and over as I made the walk home. Fear…longing…terror…pure joy. By the time I reached the house, I'm certain I was fit to be tied.

I opened the door and walked inside without greeting my mother with so much as an, "I'm back." I poured about half the water into the pot that was cooking our spicy gumbo, and _mamelah_ sat at the table cutting the meat.

I stirred the vegetables and water before sitting down and helping her chop tomatoes without being asked. I hated cutting tomatoes, but I also wanted a way to make up for being late to help with dinner. As my knife, bit and sank into the tomatoes, the juice poured all over my hands and made a sticky mess.

After I had finished cutting tomatoes and moved onto peeling potatoes, my mother spoke to me in a completely different tone of voice than with what I had left her. "You said you were talking to Lu-kas this evening. How was he?"

The familiar sensations that I associated with being around Lu-kas arose and colored my face. Mother glanced over to see if I would respond. I know she saw my face's reaction, but she didn't say anything.

I breathed deeply, willing my heart to slow and answered, "He seemed to be just fine. He was petting their cow when I saw him."

"He always did love that cow," my mother responded. "He took care of her after her heifer mother died, so no wonder he treats her like his own child," Mother smiled. "He loves animals, that much is obvious. You can tell how good a person is by the way he treats animals."

Mother dropped the smile and I watched her face. "But why did you hit him with that stick?" She asked quizzically. _Mamelah_ must have seen me talking with him, for I never told her about my tapping him on the back of the neck.

"You told me that because men are oblivious to a woman's attentions, they need to be hit upside the head. So I did, and now he notices me," I explained matter-of-factly.

My mother's face twisted into a grin that split her face. I saw her shaking and leaned over to the side to see her belly shaking with laughter. I looked back at her face.

"You didn't mean that seriously, did you _mamelah_?" I asked.

"No, I didn't mean it seriously. It is a figure of speech, Impa," she turned to me kindly and kissed my cheek.

"I saw how hard you hit him, and I don't think there was much damage done, do you?" She asked.

"I hope not," I answered. "Maybe he will continue to be oblivious."

"Maybe," mother responded. The subject was dropped; we listened in mutual quiet to the fire crackling under the pot, and the occasional bubble popping on the surface of our gumbo. The question finally became too pressing for me to hold it back any longer.

"Mother…after I have my rites…will I be matched to someone?" I asked.

_Mamelah_ bit her lips and a strange expression came over her face. Looking back as an adult, I know now that she had been anticipating the question for a long time. "Yes, we have already found someone who is going to be your life-mate." She got up to scrape her meat cuttings into the gumbo, and then she took my tomatoes and put them in as well.

I couldn't breathe I was so stupefied. _Someone had already been found for me. I was to be a wife one day. _I suddenly longed for the protection and comfort of my mother's arms, and I got up and stepped quickly to her side. Mother held me to her as she stirred and gazed into our dinner.

"Is it going to be alright?" I whispered.

She continued to look into the pot. "Yes, dear heart, it's going alright. I'm not going anywhere, and you are not going to be completely married until you are some years older."

"May I come over to your house every day?" I asked.

"You may come whenever you want, night or day," Mother said.

As we ate our dinner, I felt as though I was stuck fast between a pair of rocks close together. I felt trapped, as though my own destiny was not truly mine to control. But then my thoughts turned back to the hope of joy in marriage, and suddenly I did not feel so caught as before. More than anything else, I was simply frightened. I had never been in any other house than the one I had been born in, and the thought of creating a home of my own to raise children in nearly blew my mind. I felt as though I was growing up too quickly, and I wanted it—my life—to slow down.

Later that evening after our table had been cleared and cleaned, I decided against my usual star-gazing and stayed inside my house. Mother was writing on long pieces of parchment, perhaps notes and proposals for the next village council meeting. The tiny sound of the light digging, scratching on the paper gave some measure of comfort to me, as it was a regular and unceasing sound. The warmth of the fire on our backs also helped to ease the tension and tightness from my shoulder and lower back muscles. It wasn't until this evening that they had become knotted and tough-feeling.

It hadn't occurred to me to ask whom my life-mate was going to be. I just sat at _mamelah's_ elbow and watched her spidery, graceful handwriting shoot across the page under the quill pen, broken only by mere seconds when she re-inked her pen. I considered the possibilities of the boys my age in the village, and while they were all admirable young men, none were as perfect as Lu-kas. I found myself hoping dearly to become his life-mate, but I couldn't have had any idea of what destiny had in store for me.

Indeed, I had no control over my destiny at the time. My mother and the town council made my life for me, in the present and into the future. My own control over my life wouldn't come until some years down the road.

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**A/N: Comments and critiques are always appreciated. Thanks for reading and stay tuned!  
**


	4. Chapter 4

The next six tics of the constellations went by quickly

The next six tics of the constellations went by quickly. The days passed filled with the routines of drawing water, tending the vegetable garden, attending martial training classes and my star-gazing in the evening in the evening. The perfunctory courses had become monotonous long before this time, but now they had an unusually high sense of monotony, even my beloved star-gazing.

I was on the cusp on one of the biggest events of my entire life, and I couldn't understand why functions such as the ones assigned to me were needed. Why must I draw the water early every morning and late every evening? Why must I sweep the kitchen in the early afternoon? Why must I wash our dirty clothing every other day? It was all so meaningless to my teenaged mind. My restlessness threatened to eat me alive, and I looked more and more towards leaving the village and venturing out onto the Hyrule Plains, just to see what I could see. _Perhaps the constellations would be different on the out there_.

Mother noticed my restlessness, and so did my girlfriends. My friends and I still played under the village fruit tree grove two houses behind my own, but our play was much more mature in nature than before. Instead of pretending our pet fairies were having a tea-and-cake party under the trees, we had miniature versions of the rites of passage that were soon to begin for us. Most of the time, I had the honor of being the leader of the ceremonies.

I would hold my staff—a long stick with a ball of yarn stuck on the top—and kept my head high during our rites in play. I used the most flowery honorifics that I could conjure when describing the brave deeds of each of my girlfriends; the speed with which they carried themselves, the surefire aim that never missed the mark, and the kindness they showed others that blessed households, villages, even nations and countries.

_Another country? Another nation_...

None of us had ever been outside our tiny village. Oh, we had heard the older adults of the village describe great cities with markets that were quadruple the size of our tiny community, but our imaginations could only stretch so far. The adults with more wonders in their memories could keep their vast cities and powerful nations—I only wanted to see what the Castletown of Hyrule looked like. That one desire was just a manifestation of the increasing need to stretch my wings and fly on my own.

Another manifest desire was my increasing – and already deep – admiration for Lu-kas.

My "puppy eyes," as my friends called it, had become noticeable, and it was difficult to go through the day without at least one episode of teasing and prodding. My mind worked to ignore it, but my heart couldn't. I was certain that the life-mate that had been chosen for me was Lu-kas: my heart told me so. He had already completed his rite of passage, and when he came back two mornings after the rite had begun, he looked every bit the man I imagined him to be.

My young heart finally fell in love with him when he and the other newly-made men came home that morning.

Our entire village stood at the front gates to welcome them. We sang joyous songs, bestowed embraces, kisses, and gifts upon them, and we all danced like crazed fairies. Hop on one foot, then the other, then go back to the first, then switch again. Over and over and over. My friends and I dashed back to our houses to fetch our drums and wind-instruments and added to the commotion. I'm certain that every race in within a five hundred furlong distance heard our ruckus, because we made sure that they could.

But the entire time, my eyes were upon Lu-kas. I watched his face glow with pride, how he nearly picked up his father in a fierce embrace. His mother showered him with kisses all over his face while his whole family gave him presents and draped him with brightly colored ribbons. The morning sun shone full upon his face, and his eyes sang his victorious joy. While I gazed at his demeanor, my eyes filled with tears. He was impossibly beautiful—more than I could ever hope for.

The ear-piercing ceremony for the new men began after we had all sat down to a communal, late breakfast. All the families of the village brought at least two things to eat, so there was much to sample! I ate enough that my dress was strained to the seam-popping point.

Once I had finished my breakfast, I got up from my place between my friends and walked slowly to Lu-kas. Tonto was sitting next to him, prizing at him with all sorts of questions about Lu-kas' rite of passage. Lu-kas' mouth was full of food, and while the other new men were answering Tonto's questions for Lu-kas, Tonto continued to direct his barrage at his brother.

I quietly sat down behind Lu-kas and spoke, "It is a great thing that has happened to you today." Stupid of course—I had never heard of anyone who had _not_ gone through the rites of passage! I truly had nothing to say, but I wanted to see his eyes on me. I wanted to see if he liked me as much as I liked him.

He turned, smiled, and said in response, "Yes, indeed." That was all.

He turned back to his friends and continued talking. Tonto, however, tried to hold my eyes. I deliberately turned away and got up to see my mother.

She had seen the whole thing, and her face was utterly somber. I dropped my eyes, sat beside her, and pretended to watch the babies with their mother. When everyone else at our table became involved with their own conversations, my mother leaned close to my ear and said, "Why do you pursue something you cannot have?"

My mind froze. I hoped that she had not meant Lu-kas...

"What do you mean, _mamelah_?" I asked.

"Lu-kas has been promised to someone else," she said.

My entire spine suddenly felt as though it were on fire. My legs tingled, I felt hot and dizzy.

My face must have gone white, because mother squeezed my arm and said, "Pull yourself together for as long as the ear-piercing ceremony lasts. Then I will take you home." There was pain in her voice, and now tears welled in my eyes for a reason other than before.

I imagined myself jumping up and screaming in her face to keep her nose out of my business, my love affair. She, after all, was the one who was virtually in charge of match-making. The parents would bring forth males or females that they thought would be good for their son or daughter, there would be much discussion in the Council, but mother, the tribe's Mother Protector made the final decision.

The rest of the ceremony I felt as though my body were a shell, my heart and soul flown out into the cosmos and constellations that I loved. There was no pain there.

I remember in sharp images the ear-piercing ceremony. The newly-made men sat on small stools, and mother would go up to each one, slide a long, slender, iron needle through their ear lobes, and put earrings into place. She would then murmur a brief blessing for each one.

It was my job to hold the earthen plate that carried the needles. I walked woodenly behind my mother, but listened to each of the blessings.

"_May your garden grow tall with fruit, may the wind sing through your trees, and may the fire in your hearth never go out."_

"_May the Goddesses bless your children, your grandchildren, and your great-grandchildren. May the stars shine upon the birth of your firstborn and bless them to create a nation."_

She came to Lu-kas, and I walked slowly behind her. Too slowly, because mother reached Lu-kas sooner than I did, and turned sharply to bring me to task. "Come here," she said, and I pulled my feet hard to obey her, tears welling in my eyes again.

Mother pulled the last needle from the plate, held his right earlobe and punched the needle through with practiced precision. Shining silver earrings were placed into the holes, and as mother did so, she gave Lu-kas this blessing:

"_May the Goddesses watch over the wife of your youth, and the children you will have, and may the moon rise on your descendants forever. May the Goddesses bless you in the battles you will one day face."_

Alarm startled me out of my pained fog. _Battles he will one day face?_ Our little village, our Sheikah race, had not been involved in any war in hundreds of years, since the war in which our ancestor betrayed the Hylian Royal family. _What battles_, my mind questioned mother. But I did not speak out loud.

Mother and I left for home after the ceremony, and she held my hand as though I were a child. We were nearing the threshold of the house when I hoarsely cried, "Why?" I let the tears spill over this time, I did not hold them back.

_Mamelah_ pulled me into a tight embrace. "I am only doing what is best for you," she said.

I jerked away. "How do _you_ know what's best for me," I burst out. "You gave Lu-kas to someone else! You've hurt me!" My voice rose to piercing shriek.

Mother was silent for a moment. "The mind of a twelve year old girl is not the mind of a woman who has seen and heard much."

"You don't understand me," I cried. "How can you understand what it's like to be in love with someone like Lu-kas?"

Mother broke then. She turned into the house, and shut the door in my face. She didn't lock it, but she may as well have done so.

I turned and ran as fast as my legs could carry me to the back gates of the village. I needed out. My home, my only world suddenly felt stifling, and the source of relief was outside of the village. Far outside.

I ran past children playing in the dirt, past my playmates learning how to barter at our tiny market, and past Tonto whom I know was watching me run.

I reached the gates, and I leaned my head backwards at their height. Enormous, steel gates. It was said that there was nothing on our mortal earth that could break them. They had been engineered by the Hylian Royal familys' special metal smithies after our races' betrayal.

Of course, I wasn't thinking of all that then. I firmly placed my foot on the rock that secured the gate, and used the rock and the gate to slowly shimmy my way up and over. I fell ungracefully on the other side of the entrance, but _I was on the other side_. I began a wild dash up the rock road, which seemed to have been well-traveled once upon a time.

Boulders were set in my path, but I dodged them easily and forced my legs to pump all the harder. My lungs were on fire, and my sides ached and throbbed, but I ignored it all. The pain of my heart gave me power beyond anything I had known before. I was driven by a force I had never known, and it thrilled me alongside my indomitable pain. _Indomitable_.

I turned several corners, and then stopped my dash to see where I was. I looked up to see the top of the mountain. It hadn't occurred to me that I had been on the mountain overlooking my village—Death Mountain. I whirled to see my village seemingly miles away. I could see the new windmill that was being built, and even my little house overlooking the entrance to the front gates.

It was the reminder of my mother in that house, the reason for my pain shot power into my legs again. I focused my concentration on the very peak of the mountain and I began to run again. I hit a steep, rocky slope and I was forced to slow down and climb on my hands and knees. Both my knees and hands were scraped several times on the sharp bits of rock, but I shouted out load to myself, "It's _good for you!_ Be strong!" _Indomitable. _I would be…_indomitable._

I lurched into a valley lined by a wall of rocks rising above my head, the smoke and cloud surrounding the mountain obscured my vision, and I was forced to slow down again. I trailed my hand along the wall and trotted as fast as I dared.

Up ahead, I could see a sheer wall of rock. It must have been twenty furlongs high, at least. I dashed towards it and threw myself onto it, grabbing it with my hands and digging in with my feet. The going was quite slow—I climbed for what felt like hours. Towards the top (at the time, I didn't feel as though there would ever be a top!), my hands became exhausted and began to let me down. They were shaking with the effort of hauling my body up a wall of unforgiving rock.

Furious at my body's failure, I began to make fists of my hands and shove them into the crevices of the wall. My feet I rammed into the cracks my hands left behind. I was scraped and bleeding from nearly every bit of exposed flesh on my body, and I finally began to feel the physical pain.

I threw my left hand up, and it only felt air and the edge of top of the rock wall. I howled my relief and pain in an incoherent cry, dug my feet into the crevices one last time, and then rolled over the edge onto flat, rock ground.

For a time, I laid there in spread-eagle and stared up at the darkening sky. Twilight was upon the earth, and night was falling quickly. I ignored the sense that I needed to get home and let my conscious feel the scrapes and bruises I had given myself, feel my breath tear in and out, feel my ribs shiver with an ache that wouldn't go away.

Finally, I let the tears come. I was quiet—I would not let myself sob aloud. But I allowed the heat of my body to meld into my tears and roll into the hard ground, to be lost to me forever. Then the questions came again.

_How could mother do this to me? Why would she want to? Could she not see that I loved Lu-kas?_

And worse: _Who is Lu-kas' bride?_

My stomach retched of its own accord. I was dehydrated, and physically and emotionally exhausted. I had done too much in too short a time. Looking back as an adult, I felt too much in too short a time.

Suddenly, my ears picked up the sound of quiet struggling, scuffling. I flipped my head to look over at the edge of the rock wall, and jumped to see a pair of glowing eyes boring into mine. I smacked my hand to my hip, where I normally carried my knife, but I hadn't the foresight of mind to take it before I went on my mad dash up Death Mountain.

_Tonto. All of all people—Tonto._

I didn't look away from his gaze. He pulled himself over the top of the ridge and sat down on the ground above my head. I continued to stare at the sky, wondering when the first word between us would be spoken.

That day, it never was. We just sat and stared at the dark sky, watched the stars begin to emerge from their cloaks and spin in their paths. They came through the sun that hid them, their dances through our shadows made them more beautiful to mortals. Most especially to me.

My cuts were beginning to scab over, and eventually I sat up to feel how sore they could be in the morning. I smelled the hot sulfur in the air coming from the mountains' center that I hadn't noticed before, and felt how tangibly humid the air was. The searing lava from my heart had scaled back and only simmered.

I got up, and began the trek back down the rock wall, and Tonto followed me all the way back to the village, neither one of us speaking a word.

When we got over the gate together, we turned to our homes. I looked at him, ready to say something, anything. All he did was flip his head by way of a good-night.

I quietly opened the door to my home to see _mamelah_ sitting by the yellow-orange fire, staring into it. I was more than ready to hear her say something about what I had said earlier. Somewhere on the way back, shame had filled my heart, and now I just wanted to make things right, no matter how much my heart cried over Lu-kas.

I came up behind her, placed my hands on her shoulders and whispered, "Mama." She slid her hands over mine, and sighed. "I'm so sorry, _mamelah_," I said. "I didn't mean to dishonor you in the way I did."

"I know," she said. "In time, you will see why I made the decision I did. I have never made plans to hurt you in your future life, and I do not plan on doing so anytime soon."

I tightened my hands on her shoulders. "But where did you go?" She asked.

My throat constricted. Mama asked the question, I had to answer truthfully. Lies had no place in our world.

"I ran up Death Mountain," I said, bracing myself for a heavy castigation.

She dropped her hands and turned to look at me. "You actually _ran_ Death Mountain?" She asked.

"Yes. All the way to the peak," I answered.

Mama turned back to face the fire, but I saw a hint of a delighted smile on her face. Her next words thrilled me to the bottom of my heart.

"I believe you are ready for your rites of passage."

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**A/N: Longest chapter so far. What do you think? Constructive criticism is always encouraged and appreciated!  
**


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